Christian Louboutin sues Oh, Deer! and trademarks his red soles

It’s not hard to see why Christian Louboutin is feeling just a little bit pissed with Oh, Deer! right now, is it? Sure, lots of designers have copied the famous red soles (Hi, Steve Madden!) but Oh, Deer! have made a career out of it, copying almost every single design Louboutin produces, from the (red) sole up. No wonder the designer is seeing red (sorry).

As well as suing Oh, Deer!, though, Louboutin is also in the process of trying to trademark the idea of putting red soles on shoes. He’ll have his work cut out with this one, as Oh, Deer! are far from the only offenders: I guess my main question here is why he’s waited so long to put a stop to all the copycats.

What do you think about the move, though? I’m going to put my hands up
here and admit that I do own a couple of pairs of red-soled shoes,
neither of which are Louboutins (although I bought them for the style
of the shoe, rather than for the red soles): I also own Nine West’s
Bruges copies (which don’t have a red sole) and Steve Maddens’ Mary Janes. Given
that there’s not much hope of me being able to afford the real thing
anytime soon, I’m happy to have been able to pick up some affordable
lookalikes, although I do think Oh, Deer take it too far.

At the same time, the Louboutin red sole is all about exclusivity, and
I can understand why the designer is so mad to see it turn up at New
Look, Oh, Deer! and Steve Madden, to name but a few. I’d be happy to see the red sole made the sole property of Louboutin, although I don’t think we’ll ever see an end of the "designer inpsired" styles – and, to be honest, I’m not sure I’d want to.

What do you think? Do you buy Louboutin "copies"? Do you think he’s right to trademark his soles?